Poignancy...

What is this about poignancy that draws one to it? Is it because it leaves an aching hole? Something that cannot be placed, pointed to? That is so unseen, but it unmistakably stays with you long after the event has gone past? And when you recall it, you really wish the ending, the event or the situation turned out to be different? But the very fact that it was what it was, is the reason one is able to remember it? And when one does, it touches a chord within

1. In salangai oli, an old Kamal forming a canopy over Jayaprada’s forehead with his palms, so that the pouring rain does not wash away her sindoor, unaware that she is a widow and living in his long gone past, where he gives her up for the very idea of marriage !
2. In Shawshank Redemption, Tim Robbins sitting in the library with the Italian Soprano in the background; his face strangely at peace, oozing a strange glow of independence that itself is poignantly at odds with where he was – serving life imprisonment for murder of his wife
3. In “Elizabeth town”, Susan Sarandon, during the tribute meeting to her dead husband, showing off her new dance-skills; as something she learned after his death, the first time she ever had to do something without him
4. A 12 year old kid, perhaps drawing from her own experience, writes a story where the protagonist (a young girl) dies of cancer…
5. In Shakti, Dileep Kumar meeting with Amitabh to break the news of his mother’s death, but hardly speaking a word with each other (and in the earlier Tamil version of Thangapathakam, Sivaji makes it equally poignant in his own garrulous overplayed way)

[This list will grow]

As I write those, I vividly remember those moments; but perhaps incongruously fondly too? For, those have helped etch some memories in me - the differentiating ones in the sameness of every day. Aching, maybe; but differentiating all the same!!!